A Sleepyhead
by Measured
Summary: "C'mon, sleepin' beauty," Scout said. He gently rubbed her shoulders. "That's no place to pass out." Scout/Miss Pauling.


Title: A Sleepyhead  
Series: TF2  
Character/Pairing: Scout/Miss Pauling  
Rating: PG  
Author's note: cottoncandybingo: being helped. multiversecafe's request. :) :) :)... hm... request workaholic miss pauling sleeping at her desk and scout finds her and 'tucks her in.' She was kind enough to beta it as well.

Established relationship.

**.**

He'd been waiting up for three hours, until he'd practically broken his watch with how many times he'd checked it, shaken it and brought it up to his ear, smacked it on the wall...actually it was probably broken now. He had a lot of amazing qualities– and one of his favorite hobbies was reminding people of them– but patience was not one of them.

But that didn't stop him from doing' a frigging _Olympic level _ waiting game. Even if he wasn't good at something, that didn't stop him from doing the hell out of it and doing a damn fine job. He was just awesome like that.

The light fixture above him flickered off. Inside, he could hear Engineer swearing, and Demoman laughing. Never a good combination. The middle of the base was knee-deep in twilight, until he could barely walk without smacking his face into stuff. And that was no good, as he'd been pacing back and forth for a while now, until his muscles felt too tight, like how his shins used to ache from all the running back in Southie. Back before Doc could just heal him up, he'd gone and pulled muscles, ran until he'd have his feet covered in blisters, until he could barely walk.

He leaned back and sighed. He checked his watch again. He couldn't even hear a tick anymore, not that he could see in this light. Yep, definitely broken.

"All right, I'lll juuust. Check on her. Look in the window a bit," Scout said to himself.

Finally, Scout set off for the building, looking it over. Cameras everywhere. No problem. He'd been running in and dodging bullets, sentries, flamethrowers, rockets and whatever else BLU could toss his way and stealing their info for ages. He smirked as he staked out the place. The only regret he had was that Miss Pauling wouldn't be able to later catch his _damn fine moves _ on camera.

Oh well, he'd just have to do a personal show for her later. It was a crime for her to miss something this good.

Her office was on the second floor on this base, though only temporary because somebody had blown up her first-floor office. That somebody was probably Soldier, because when anything happened, it was usually Soldier. Not even Demoman on his worst bender could cause chaos like Soldier did. Though he'd manage pretty close if they were both out drunk together.

The first obvious case was the fire escape, but that was rusty and loud, and Engineer kept sentries out there. He didn't ask why old gearhead thought it a great idea to keep sentries in the bathrooms, the showers, or wherever else he wanted. Even though Scout knew they technically were on his side, he couldn't get past the fear that one day they'd go killer robot on him. He saw something _just _ like that over at the theaters, and he wasn't taking any chances.

His last couple attempts to go at it Spidey style had put him in Respawn. He might have as good lines as Peter Parker, but he'd yet to be able to scale walls.

He squinted and saw one of the windows on the first floor was open a crack. Perfect. He leapt from shadow to shadow, snickering to himself as he did. He was friggin' Batman! He shoved the window up and pulled himself in. Score! The door gave way to his superior charm, or maybe it was just unlocked. No guards, so he rushed up the stairs, jumping them three at a time.

Okay, stealth was another thing he wasn't too good at. Stealth was for douchebags, anyways. Red-suited douchebags who threw buckets of chicken and slept with a guy's mother. Everyone knew the cool guys gave a speech about how much the other guy sucked before bashing in his skull.

He'd memorized the path to her office, past all the metal fricking more metal hallways that all looked the damn same. Except one would lead to the bathroom, and the other would lead to the room where Medic and Engineer's Cyborg Bear experiments were kept. And that was not a mistake anybody wanted to make, least of all when they really had to take a leak.

He stopped abruptly, knocking with the back of his fist. No response. He opened the door to find her sprawled out on the desk. Her glasses were crooked, her hair mussed and partly undone around her face. A bunch of filed papers were neatly stacked up on her desk, with a huge pile still to be done. He'd been kind of neutral towards The Voice, because hey, she paid him, but lately the old crow had been on his shit list. Because without him around, Miss Pauling would go without breakfast, skip every break, and accept her one day off a year being taken from her.

"C'mon, sleepin' beauty," Scout said. He gently rubbed her shoulders. "That's no place to pass out."

She groaned. She opened her beautiful green eyes just a little. She closed her eyes again and yawned. Papers knocked over her desk as she pushed herself up. "I nodded off? I have...more to..."

"Sleep," he said. "C'mere, gorgeous. There's a feather bed with your name on it."

"–I can walk," she said.

"Y'know, it's great how you're savin' the day all the time and all, but you gotta let me save the day at least a little."

"Mmm. It's a long ways back," she said. "And my feet are really sore today—"

"Easy Peasy, piece of frickin' cake with delicious ice cream on it," Scout said.

"If you say I'm too heavy, I'm pushing you out of bed," she replied with sleepy sternness.

"Not gonna happen. These arms are made of steel and more steel. Oh, and awesomeness."

She reached out to wind her arms about his neck. He picked her up bridal style. He nudged the door almost closed with his ass—score one more superpower for his ass!—and headed down the stairs. She rested her head against his chest. Was there ever a girl as amazing and perfect and classy and gorgeous as this one?

Psych! It was trick question, because hell no there wasn't.

"So, Miss Pauling, you didn't skip dinner again, right? You ate, right? Cause I can totally go grab something quick—"

"Mmmmm yes. If you talk just a little louder, you should have everyone on base catch us," she said.

"Good. Then they'll know what a _lucky bastard _ I am, almost as lucky as you for getting a handsome piece of hotness."

She laughed. "They were there when it happened."

"I'm good at remindin' people," Scout said.

He walked out into the twilight. The Engineer was swearing up a storm in the bunks, which really wasn't good. Another explosion, some more screaming. Just a usual day at work.

"More paperwork to come," she said with a sigh.

"Probably," Scout said.

He only set her down a second to unlock the door of her small, on-base apartment. He got such a kick out of carrying her in, like newlyweds every single day, even if they weren't married yet. He knew his way so well from sneaking into her house that he didn't even bump the lamps and end tables or couches as he walked through her apartment.

He nudged the light switch with his shoulder, and turned the faint lights on, before they flickered off again. Man, Demoman must've done a number on the power lines if even the backup generators were affected.

"Bottom switch," she said sleepily. He nudged that one as well, and a set of fairy lights hidden in the room turned on. Apparently they went all through the house, hidden under curtains so that she'd never be completely in the dark.

"Stealth with style," Scout said with pride in his voice.

It was with reluctance that he let her go at her little purple bed, which was technically too small for him, but spooned up beside her he barely noticed that he had to curl up or fall off.

Her heels fell off, and she pushed them aside with her feet. She fell back on the bed, pinching the bridge of her nose a moment before letting out a long sigh.

"Long day?" Scout said.

"Extremely," she said.

She undressed slowly as he watched. Not with her usual sensual ways, but with yawns in between, like she was about to nod off right then and there. He leaned in quick and helped, making short work of her clothes until she was stripped down to almost nothing. He stayed just a moment to take in the sight of her, so curvy, soft and damn perfect. She wasn't just hot, she was a _friggin' work of art_. Seriously, museums had _nothing _ on Miss Pauling.

"Enjoying the view?" Miss Pauling said.

"_Always,_" Scout replied.

Scout pulled his gaze away with reluctance and dug into her big closet. Her work clothes were all at the back on hangers, a whole palette of different shades of purple. He dug into the shelves until he found just what he was looking for. Scout tossed a cotton nightie her way. Not his favorite silky purple one which he could rip off her fast enough to break the sound barrier, but something comfortable and soft and high-necked that he knew she liked.

Scout knew he wasn't getting any of that tonight. Getting left in the cold was never fun, but after his Waiting Game, he could take every single red week or headache or too tired nights. Because a couple days without getting any was a whole lot different than a couple _years_ without getting any.

And because she was worth whatever amount of waiting he had to do.

She pulled the nightie over her head and rubbed her face on the softness for a moment. He'd been tempted to do the same, but he preferred to rub his face on her nighties when she was actually wearing them, for maximum softness.

"Gimme a kiss before I go, sleepin' beauty," Scout said.

"Aren't you going to stay?" Miss Pauling said.

"Figured you just wanted to sleep," Scout said.

"Yes, but I'll need someone to wash my back in the shower tomorrow morning," Miss Pauling said.

"Babe, you know _just _ the right words to say," Scout said.

He stripped down to his underwear and t-shirt in a matter of seconds, and snuck in under the purple covers with her. Up came the blanket up around them, and a mutual sigh of contentment as he pulled his arms about her.

He'd never get over how wonderful it was that she liked him about as much as he liked her. Just seeing her smile at him, listen to him, _pay attention to him _ utterly made his day. It didn't matter that he had to crunch in, that he probably wouldn't get any sleep tonight because he was so excited for the morning, or that he'd be chugging coffee and BONK all morning to stay awake. He'd run the frigging length of the Earth ten times over if she asked. A little more waiting was nothing.


End file.
